Insider Selling: Pegasystems (NASDAQ:PEGA) CAO Sells $26,062.50 in Stock

Pegasystems Inc. (NASDAQ:PEGA) CAO Efstathios Kouninis sold 750 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, May 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $34.75, for a total transaction of $26,062.50. Following the transaction, the chief accounting officer owned 2,894 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $100,566.50. The trade was a 20.58% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink.

Pegasystems Stock Performance

Pegasystems stock opened at $35.44 on Friday. Pegasystems Inc. has a 52-week low of $32.00 and a 52-week high of $68.10. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $37.86 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $46.42. The firm has a market cap of $5.92 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 19.05 and a beta of 0.86.

Pegasystems (NASDAQ:PEGA) last released its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 21st. The technology company reported $0.46 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $0.68 by ($0.22). Pegasystems had a return on equity of 30.05% and a net margin of 20.04%.The firm had revenue of $429.97 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $473.24 million. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $0.76 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was down 9.6% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, equities research analysts predict that Pegasystems Inc. will post 1.95 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Pegasystems Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, April 15th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, April 1st were issued a dividend of $0.03 per share. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, April 1st. This represents a $0.12 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.3%. Pegasystems’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 6.45%.

Institutional Trading of Pegasystems

Several hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of PEGA. AQR Capital Management LLC grew its position in Pegasystems by 236.2% in the 2nd quarter. AQR Capital Management LLC now owns 4,037,552 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $217,584,000 after purchasing an additional 2,836,733 shares during the period. State Street Corp grew its position in Pegasystems by 255.3% in the 2nd quarter. State Street Corp now owns 2,907,677 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $157,393,000 after purchasing an additional 2,089,375 shares during the period. American Century Companies Inc. grew its position in Pegasystems by 357.6% in the 3rd quarter. American Century Companies Inc. now owns 1,586,793 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $91,241,000 after purchasing an additional 1,239,998 shares during the period. Copeland Capital Management LLC acquired a new stake in Pegasystems in the 1st quarter valued at $47,817,000. Finally, First Trust Advisors LP grew its position in Pegasystems by 271.7% in the 3rd quarter. First Trust Advisors LP now owns 1,111,736 shares of the technology company’s stock valued at $63,925,000 after purchasing an additional 812,634 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 46.89% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research analysts have issued reports on PEGA shares. Citizens Jmp lowered their price target on shares of Pegasystems from $78.00 to $58.00 and set a “market outperform” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, February 12th. DA Davidson set a $55.00 price target on shares of Pegasystems and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, April 17th. Wall Street Zen downgraded shares of Pegasystems from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research report on Saturday, February 14th. Weiss Ratings raised shares of Pegasystems from a “hold (c)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research report on Wednesday, May 20th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $60.00 price objective (down from $65.00) on shares of Pegasystems in a research report on Wednesday, April 22nd. Eight investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and three have assigned a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Pegasystems has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $63.70.

About Pegasystems

Pegasystems Inc is a software company specializing in customer engagement and digital process automation solutions. Headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Pegasystems develops enterprise applications designed to help organizations streamline operations, manage customer interactions and automate complex workflows. Its platform supports a wide range of use cases, from sales and marketing optimization to case management and robotic process automation.

The core of Pegasystems’ offering is the Pega Platform, a low-code development environment that enables businesses to build and deploy applications with minimal hand-coding.